Kimi Raikkonen out of title hunt

Kimi Raikkonen’s battle with Robert Kubica was fought over more than just second place. Raikkonen was fighting to keep his championship hopes alive – and he lost.

Raikkonen is 21 points behind Lewis Hamilton with 20 left to be won this year. Thus his chances of retaining the crown he won in 2007 are over.

That means whichever of the remaining contenders wins the title this year – Hamilton, Felipe Massa or Robert Kubica – it will be a first time champion, and the 29th different title winner in the sport’s 59-year history.

maybe not the best but hes surely the fastest. he has 10 fastest laps out of 16. that means 10 times he was the fastest man on track somewhere (usually near the end of the race)… he has just not been consistent enough.

In all fairness, Raikkonen has not performed this year. He had to wait six, long years to get his Finnish fingers on that trophy, alot of nails were chewed along the way. I always admired his driving, especially in his early years, with relatively no prior experience. The 2002 race at Magny Cours comes to mind, against Schumacher, and that patch of oil that cost Raikkonen the race.
The desire was there, the hunger. The worrying thing is that Raikkonen looks more like Hakkinen did back in 2001, just before he retired. He looks completely disinterested in what he is doing, totally uncomfortable. I hope I am proven wrong.

For 30 Million a year he should be ashamed to be dusted each and every race by Massa.

He needs to have a good hard look at himself and either shape up or ship out.

BTW it is good to be back on the forum and in GP world again. I have just returned from my honeymoon and spent a great day with the bride on the lounge watching 1000km of Bathurst and a great Japanese GP.

Do you reckon Fred might want to stick around with Renault based on this late season form?!

Congratulations to Terry F. – hope it will be a long and happy relationship , also filled with many hours of watching intense motorsport battles ! Kimi is out of it , which will hopefully make him come back stronger next year. He was described as a “sleeping giant” by a commentator , which I thought was a great description. Whether it’s the car not suited to him , his motivation , lack of fitness or all put together , cannot avoid feeling he is operating way below his maximum this year , and would not have deserved a championship anyway.

Well as long as it is a ferrari, i dont mind to be honest, but raikkonen dropped the ball a few times this year, that and a combination of bad luck didnt help him.
whatever it is, he better be on his game next year or i suspect it would be his last. as for Felipe, i think the Pastaman is well worthy of taking it, and i hope he does. adn i wouldnt be the bit annoyed if Hamilton is slapped a penalty for racing (in a McLaren). i think if there is really prejudice, it’s aimed at McLaren not L.H. but i have a good feeling that all will go normal.
Vai Vai Massa.

I think it was Kimi’s fitness that let him down this year. His inability to stay focused during a race weekend I can attribute to fitness. He has taken the lazy mans approach to racing, but it can only take you so far.
Luck played a big hand in his winning the championship last year, perhaps he thought it would be easy again. If he continues like this, with a casual approach to racing, then it will be his last championship.

No offense to Alonso, he might not be close enough to affect the results (despite winning back to back races), and it’s not like he’s going to yield his places for them if he’s in a podium position. Maybe if he were being lapped he could make life difficult…

Anyways, I’d love for Kubica to win it – would be amazing to watch that, and he thoroughly deserves it. Of course, I’d love a Ferrari to win, so I hope Massa gets the job done in China – because we know that Massa is strong in Brazil and his chances are very good there. As is Kimi, so hopefully Brazil is just a formality – China may have the answer.